joi, 2 iulie 2009

Start Anew

It was a cold December night in West Orange, New Jersey. ThomasEdison's factory was humming with activity. Work was proceedingon a variety of fronts as the great inventor was trying to turnmore of his dreams into practical realities. Edison's plant,made of concrete and steel, was deemed "fireproof". But itwasn't.

On that cold night in 1914, the sky was lit up by a sensationalblaze that had burst through the plant roof. Edison's24-year-old son, Charles, made a frenzied search for his famousinventor-father. When he finally found him, he was watching thefire. His white hair was blowing in the wind. His face wasilluminated by the leaping flames. "My heart ached for him,"said Charles. "Here he was, 67 years old, and everything he hadworked for was going up in flames. When he saw me, he shouted,"Charles! Where's your mother?" When I told him I didn'tknow, he said, "Find her! Bring her here! She'll never seeanything like this as long as she lives."

Next morning, Edison looked at the ruins of the factory and saidthis of his loss: "There's value in disaster. All our mistakesare burned up. Thank God, we can start anew."

Moral: Don't worry when a seeming disaster hits you. It may justbe the chance to clear out all your mistakes and start afresh.